WISCONSIN RAPIDS – Although it might have gone by a different name when it was founded, Solarus has thrived in Wisconsin Rapids since it opened in 1896 as Wood County Telephone Co.

During its 118 years in business, the company has only had six CEOs and has broadened its services from just telephone products to providing cable, Internet and a whole other host of telecommunications services.

The largest independent telephone company in Wisconsin, the business prides itself in providing the area with innovative technology. Earlier this year, the company announced its one-gigabit broadband Internet, which equates to 1,000 megabits per second, and made it available to residential and business customers.

Solarus' director of sales and marketing Mike Meinel sat down with Gannett Central Wisconsin Media to talk about the company's ties to the area. The following interview was edited for clarity and brevity.

118 years ago, (we) decided to start the business here, and we were able to stay in business for that long and prosper in this community. In central Wisconsin, there's great infrastructure — the roads in town (and) the schools are good. The affordability of living and the quality of life is good in north central Wisconsin. (All of this has) afforded us this ability to live, stay here and prosper for the past 118 years.

What makes you proud about working at Solarus?

What makes me most proud about working here is probably the history of the people being around as long as we have been. The average tenure is probably around 15 years. So people get jobs here, stay here and retire here. It's a great place to work — very good pay and benefits — and people take a lot of pride in their work here. They take a lot of pride in being locally owned. They take a lot of pride in being a small company that's a technology leader — not just in Wisconsin Rapids, but a national technology leader.

One of the value drivers of the community is to help ensure the community's long-term prosperity and how we help do that is (that) we are locally owned by shareholders. We annually, probably average about $150,000 to $200,000 of giving back to the community, a year. It's important to give back to the community; we've been here for 118 years and (these) people — who are our neighbors, friends we go to church with, (and) who our kids go to school with — are our customers. We give money to people who have Solarus, we give money to people who have our competitors — so we try to spread the money as evenly as we can.

What specifically has Solarus accomplished that makes you — and the Solarus company in general — proud?

It's an industry of constant change and there's a lot of consolidation going on. We've been around a long time, we've been able to pay back our shareholders and we have also been able to reinvest in our community for best-in-class service for our existing customers and anyone who wants to switch for us.